This is not one you'll see in the news, but I still like it. First off, it is shallow, but with no fault mechanism, so we won't know if it is compressive. If it was compressive, it could be a super-quake like the Philippines. Second, it is in Taiwan, with excellent instrumentation, and these guys know the importance of PGV, unlike the thickies here in our neck of the woods.

As you can see, Taiwan is at a glorious plate intersection. They have the advantage that they'll never get a nearby M9, but that only matters for tsunamis. They can get super-quakes right under their cities, so that'll be the maximum PGV quake. I don't know if the place is being ripped apart or compressed. I think from the last big quake, it is probably being sheared.

Anyway, an M6.3 right in the mountains probably caused a few rockfalls. I do hope they had strong motion detectors right over the epicentre. Might be a new record for PGV.

Bought myself a new gigabyte switch. Didn't realize that all my stuff supported the higher speed, and the old switch was holding them back. Also some bad cables. You really need the higher speed for the hd movies.

I also had to improve my zotac. I was running xbmcbuntu which was at an old version. I put on the latest Debian kernel, which had all the latest drivers for the ethernet and the Intel graphics chip, and something extra for the duo Atom chips. The picture is much better, and there is no more hesitation on the extremely busy scenes (try Hello Dolly!). I did run into the infamous tmpfs problem, and this can be solved by various means. I did two things at once "make localmodconfig" and a change under 'Generic drivers' for the tmpfs. So I don't know what did it.

This zotac only does 720p which is enough for a 50" plasma in a small room. The resolution is amazing. If you have a bigger screen, and you like to sit with your nose touching, then you need the latest zotac. :) I simply can't imagine a 4K screen! The high resolution is distracting for a first view, it is only good after you've watched your Jane Austen a dozen times! (Look at that lace!)

Monday, October 28, 2013

So, the Pacific air is driven up over the North, down to freeze off my buns on my son's last baseball game yesterday, and over to Europe. It is driving away all hurricanes for us, but sending them to Britain. You can see that big lash that got them, since this is the last 72 hours. Perhaps wind and ocean currents have something to do with climate. :)

Saturday, October 26, 2013

I don't have a great reason to report 'Yet Another Earthquake', but this one seems to be stretching south. Who knows where the actual injection point is? Like the Virginia earthquake and the dam, sometimes these things stretch until they find a major fault. There's a bit of a linear there, just south, which would be one of the NW cross-faults. I don't expect much since the city injection hasn't triggered it, but you never know. :)

Just a reminder, that everything I say is an original thought, without a speck of 'conventional' support. Some crotchety person mentioned this in a comment that I didn't publish. But don't forget that all these earthquakes take place in the Precambrian which is totally unstudied in these parts. It is totally unstudied in Ontario, as well, beneath the Bruce Black Hole, except in a few obscure journal articles, which I have mentioned. As well, we did a lot of geophysics in the lakes which is also buried. Perhaps that is why I semi-wish for one heck of an earthquake down here. Very cringe-worthy. :)

Friday, October 25, 2013

This is really top secret. I'm hoping nobody reads it. As mentioned, my little dog valley has been invaded by huge trucks laying in erosion protection. The recent big flood has left one section of sewer pipe hanging,, and one section exposed. They are now pouring in armour stone and rip-rap.

I just walked it with the new puppy, and another old engineer. We have watched the flash floods through this valley for 20 years, and noted the erosion rate, which has increased an order of magnitude in the last few years. Perhaps Global Warming taking a bite!

Anyway, we looked at the work, and we both feel that they have underestimated the flood forces by a factor of 10. This will be fun to watch over the next few years. If everything only lasts two years max, they should be able to say this was only temporary. :)

If you don't think that Bruce is following a popular maffie tv show, then remember what they did when they were going to put a nuclear plant at several ridiculous places. That show was to support AECL against the feds.

Now, poor OPG can't put on fancy dinners, but they do the gov't dirty work in other ways, such as the Niagara Tunnel, which was a pure political monstrosity.

Anyway, this is just for interest. We all know this happens, and I don't get my nose out of joint. You shouldn't either.

Monday, October 21, 2013

This is about $30 billion for two 1600 MW plants. These are evolved PWR's that run with 5% enriched fuel. The design can be considered a million times safer than an old Japanese boiling water reactor with backup generators in the basement.

The Europeans are totally botching their new plants, but I think it is problems with cheesy French concrete. The Chinese know how to build a reactor.

Obviously, Ontario is now committed 100% to fracking gas, but if that choice proves to be problematic by giant earthquakes, then we can go this route only if we fire everybody in OPG and poach Chinese engineers. :) That will never happen, and so we are happily spending our billions on our own engineering disasters.

ps. Hey the gov't says it's going to be open about all this overspending crap. Go Niagara Tunnel!

Sunday, October 20, 2013

These two earthquakes are of exactly the same magnitude, but in different sections. Yet the Precambrian geology is probably similar. At least in Canada, we can map the geology, and down in OK, they haven't a clue. The upper earthquake is in the W. Quebec Zone, a place of frequent, small earthquakes. These earthquakes are activated by a gradient in post-glacial uplift. We can expect a big M6+ earthquake along the rifted edges of this zone every hundred years or so.

The WQ zone is characterized by highly fractured rock with no great linear zones, except for the ancient rifts. Thus, we only expect an M5 maximum in this area, because everything is so mixed up. An M5 only has a fault area of about 300 m, so it doesn't need much coherence.

This is probably the same in OK, in the western section away from their M5.6. These earthquakes are activated by deep injection. Right now everything has been limited to M3, simply because they can't detect anything less, and the rock is probably highly fractured, and mixed up. Thus, we expect a larger number than 10 for the ratio between magnitudes. Nevertheless, as with WQ, there is no physics that limits the size up to M5. If we want to go to M6 and beyond, it has to be on a major structure, such as the nearby megathrust.

It remains to be seen whether OK can last 100 years between a major M6+, since their rate of M3's might be a factor of 10 over WQ. As usual, if you are on swamp, get earthquake insurance. The Clueless Swiss will insure anything!

Saturday, October 19, 2013

The cottage is closed, and just in time for the usual November weather. We have been socked in with rain for a week, and looks like another week. This is the Ontario weather I remember. Do you want to guess how much wind and solar power is generated with damp, dreary, still, depressive weather? As much as the Niagara Tunnel generates - Nada - Zilch.

Nothing new here in politics. No earthquakes. I'm doing my best to keep up my spirits. :)

Tuesday, October 15, 2013

That piece of concrete on the top picture is the erosion shield of an old inadequate sewer of vital service. It was apparently perforated, and large sections were exposed to the river. Had the valley not being so beautiful, I'm sure it would have been ripped out and replaced by now.

The Big Flood created the crisis. People's basements flooded, and I'm sure the pipe was nearly broken in two. I haven't gone to the valley for a long time, since the old dog got sick. Now I am told that they bulldozed in a big road and are tackling the sewer. They may even try to 'engineer' the creek since that Queenston shale erodes like toilet paper.

Ode to the trees - I think I shall never see, a sewer as beautiful as a tree.

I feel like such a scab using the USGS web site. But they keep things going for the big earthquakes, even though there are all sorts of disclaimers that nothing may be accurate.

This is the setting of the earthquake. Note the big subduction zone, and there should be a lot of volcanoes. Normally, you only expect 'normal' earthquakes in this back region, but this was a shallow thrust.

I have no idea why, except that these things happen when the upper plate is being driven over the subduction zone. Tends to squeeze off the volcanoes, or make them more violent when they do blow. Nevertheless, a shallow thrust like this would mean a high PGV at the surface, which meshes with some of the reports. Good thing this was a lightly populated area. Without instrumentation, we'll never know if this was a super-quake.

Update: The pictures show a general PGV of only 20 cm/s with probable soil amplification of 5 times. There are large settlements. You need a good USGS guy to look around. :)

Well, the hearings are over, and I am happy to say that not one objection that I have, ever got into the hearings! That means I am a total non-entity, which is a happy place. :)

Since grout and pumping was never mentioned, they have full license to pump an infinite amount of grout in, and pump out an infinite amount of rock water. There will be no problem in disposing of the water, since they only need to dig a 'holding pond', down to the karst, and the water will magically stay the same level, no matter how much water they pump in, and since they don't have to report, who says they are pumping any water at all??

Will the thing get approved? Darn right! There are no provisions in the panel money for a negative result. In other words, the panel is being paid just enough to wrap it up. As usual, they will approve it with some hard questions to save face. But who is looking at the answers? The panel will be down south, drinking smoothies.

Even with everything going for them, they won't be able to get down 50 feet. They are ignoring the geology, just like the Niagara Tunnel. But I'm rooting for them! Like every geological disaster these guys stumble into, I will learn a lot. They'll never learn anything, since they make a lot more money this way.

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Ah, there goes my chance for a cushy double-dipping consultant job. But don't worry people, I'm sure they can make the Darlington refurb as expensive as a new plant. Then they can hide the costs until the Auditor comes along.

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Even without a change in government, the bugs crawl out from under the rock. I am hoping they will go next for the Niagara Tunnel, the most useless thing ever built for a few billion. As we can see, it used to be easy to hide costs, and the credibility of the previous gang is zip-oh!.

If the Big Auditor went after the Tunnel To Nowhere, they would see it doesn't add a penny of income without increasing the pumped storage, and that's not happening. I really hope they do the audit.

Sunday, October 6, 2013

This is a list of things to do to test my New Madrid hypothesis. Unfortunately, we can never expect the USGS to have any money again, since everybody is so convinced on tying hungry mothers with rich farm corporation give-aways.

Broad reflection seismic

This is what Canada has been doing for years. It uses surplus oil company vibrator trucks and makes transects. You can see the Megathrusts. The US ignores it, as well as the Bruce Nuclear black hole. A study like this would prove the megathrusts extend all the way down past New Madrid.

Injection to deliberately cause earthquakes

This would be fun! I propose an injection site on the other side of the New Madrid zone, from Arkansas. The hypothesis would be confirmed if you got a symmetric result. As well, they should set up injection right into the heart of New Madrid, and show that there is no effect. It would take a brave person to do that!

Saturday, October 5, 2013

During the US gov't scientist furlough, I reign supreme! Muhaha! Canadian scientists are all muzzled, and university scientists are all busy publishing in shady journals. I could publish in a vanity 'publish or perish' journal, too, but I would never want to be in a journal that would have me. :)

So I noticed that everybody wants to ask about the New Madrid fault zone. I have finally crystallized my thoughts on this, which means I cast a hypothesis and wait for further data to confirm or destroy it. This is what a 'purist' does (hey Mr. Climate Person?).

With the new experience in Arkansas, I am now convinced that the New Madrid events were a one shot deal. All of the Precambrian megathrusts are under high stress, and it just takes a little water. Especially in Arkansas, it has been shown that a steady injection of water can grow a baby New Madrid. You could easily duplicate this with finite difference computer modelling, or a testing machine.

So, at one time in the past thousand years or so, the Mississippi changed course, and placed a lot of water on top of a vital drain. This initiated the sequence, and each shift in the earth allowed more water to penetrate. The earthquake zone grew until it reached its penultimate, which was the series of M7.7 earthquakes that penetrated the entire crust and reached the edges of the fracture zone. Stability here means that the water flow has ceased, and equilibrium has been reached.

Does this mean that everybody in the region can build soft-story condos on swamps? No, the general seismic hazard for the region is probably the same as any other place in the East, including Toronto. New Madrid was a huge disturbance to the local stresses. The figure shows my estimate of the stress-relieved zone. We must expect M6 or 7 activity at the boundaries, provided there is a deep drain for water. These will be excellent places for waste water injection! :)

So, I relegate the hazard and risk to the same as anywhere else. As I have mentioned before, engineering is wrong in supporting floppy buildings on soft soil. We won't see much with an M6, such as Virginia, but an M7 is a different story. In the meantime, everybody should be happy!

Oklahoma remains blessed. After the M3.5, I thought we might get something bigger, but it has stayed at the 3 level. We still aren't getting the micro-earthquakes, so I assume their seismic monitoring is still in the pits.

I had assumed that Ok city had the Grenville megathrust, which is the last of ones I know about, so I'm interested in how these new quakes are doing. Although people constantly state that there are thousands of injection wells with no earthquakes, I am more interested in high-volume wells into the Precambrian. Farther west we hit the Archean, and then the mountain disturbance. I don't know the stresses there, but they are generally not compressive because of the heat flow supporting the mountains.

Friday, October 4, 2013

There are many worries about the States right now, mainly the inevitable default. But Canadians shouldn't worry, since it has happened before. It was called the Civil War.

Of course, there won't be millions dead, just millions of lost houses. Nowadays, war is fought by proxy, in this case, in Washington. The South voted for people with the slogan - No More Death or Taxes, having never heard the old expression, since the education system there is all religious. Everybody there knows about the Garden of Eden, and we can get back there again if we disavow all knowledge.

Canada never suffered much during the last Civil War. In fact, we did quite well with energetic refugees flooding in. There is the matter of my son in California, but they were never part of the US during that last war, and aren't a part of it now. They better not have an earthquake, though!

As usual, after years of bashing each other senseless, they will give up, and try to be sensible for a while. In the meantime, we will listen to all the slogans of war, demonizing the other side, calling them sub-human, etc. When you think about it, this new Civil War has been going on for some time.

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Well, the USGS earthquake map is dark, thanks to Machiavelli, but this map is still up. I'm getting tired of these earthquakes, since they all pop along at M3. Anything in Arkansas immediately escalates up, but these earthquakes are stuck in a rut.

Until now! We got a series culminating in an M3.5. Is this the one to finally break M4?

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

OMG, you'd think they'd put in 5 minutes of preparation for this! They were my last hope for intelligence, but the irony of coming from the Detroit wasteland, crying environment! A little radioactivity would do that place some good! Anyway, this is payback for the Windsor Hum.